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Month: September 2014

University has restarted on Monday and as I also sing in an operetta which will première next week (= rehearsals every day) I experienced a harsh change from as much leisure time as I could possibly imagine to practically none at all. What I need now are quick recipes for easy desserts which can be whipped up in no time and which still taste fantastic.

And I have good news: This date cake fulfills all the conditions!

Furthermore, it also not too heavy as the recipe goes without butter. The dates add some moistness to the fluffy texture of the cake – this cake really has it all!

No, the “I’don’t have time”-excuse won’t work this time – start baking! 🙂

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Date Cake with a Whiff of Icing Sugar

Preparation time: about 15 min (including making the paper cut)

Baking time: 40-45 min

Yield: one cake (24-26 cm Ø)

Ingredients:

175g icing sugar

6 egg yolks

200g hazelnuts (roasted and ground)

150-200g dates (as you like it)

1 tbsp. rum

½ lemon, zest and juice

6 egg whites, very stiff

1 pinch of salt

Preparation Instructions:

Preheat oven to 180°C (350°F).

Whisk icing sugar and egg yolks until light and fluffy.

Add roasted and ground hazelnuts.

Chop the dates into small chunks. Add.

Add rum, lemon juice and lemon zest. Whisk well.

Whisk egg whites with a pinch of salt until very stiff. Fold the egg whites carefully into the date mixture. Put the batter into a well-greased round springform pan (24-26 cm Ø).

Bake on the lowest level in the preheated oven for 40-45 minutes.

While the cake is in the oven make the paper cut. Cut the paper to match the size of the springform pan. Try to cut away as much paper as possible to create a lot of space for the icing sugar. Iron the paper cut or put under something heavy to flatten it.

Cover the cooled cake with the paper cut and dust it with icing sugar to create a lovely pattern.

(recipe after Betty Bossi)

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To get a printed version: Download the pdf. (Both English and German versions available!)

When Bettina asked me if I wanted to submit a recipe for her blog I did not hesitate for a second about writing a guest post. We both share a passion for baking so of course I said yes. As I was thinking of what I could bake for this blog post, I found myself staring at the huge plum tree in our garden. Why not include plums when we have loads of them (we’ve harvested about 6kg a day for the past two weeks)! But I didn’t want to make another plum tart, another plum mousse or another Zwetschgendatschi, I wanted to try a new way of baking with plums. So I stumbled across this delicious combination of plums and peaches, another favourite summer fruit of mine.

The combination of this ‘barely-a-recipe’ recipe is so simple, yet so sweet and delicious. Give it a go as long as you can still get fresh plums and fresh peaches!

P.S. I would love to hear what other ways of baking with plums you know. 🙂

– Kathrin

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Peach and Plum Galette

yields: 8 portionspreparation time: 20 minutesbaking time: 30 minutes

Ingredients:

for the pastry dough:

250g flour

150g cold butter

70ml cold water

2 tbsp icing sugar

Pinch of salt

for the galette filling:

6 medium plums

3 medium peaches

1 tbsp ground hazelnut

1 tbsp sugar

1 egg whisked with 1 tbsp water

Method:

To make the pastry combine flour, the icing sugar, water and salt in a bowl. Cut in the butter and start to knead carefully. If too sticky, add more flour. Knead until fully combined and wrap the dough ball onto a piece of plastic wrap. Let it chill for at least one hour in the refrigerator.

Meanwhile, quarter the fruits, remove the pits and slice each quarter into three pieces.

Preheat the oven to 180°C.

Roll out the cool dough on a lightly floured surface into a circle, about 3mm thick. Carefully transfer the dough onto a baking sheet lined with parchment paper.

I’m afraid I’ve got a bit of a problem with cupcakes. I mean – they look so fabulous: a lovely muffin decorated with a beautiful frosting. But there’s the rub. I don’t like buttercream. It’s not just that it is about as unhealthy as it can get (that alone could probably not stop me, at least not completely 😉 ) it’s also that I really dislike the taste of it.

Fortunately, I’ve discovered a couple of frostings which aren’t based on butter and still look fantastic. Mernique frosting is one possibility (as shown in the Chai-Latte-Cupcakes recipe) – and here’s another one.

It’s based on mascarpone – not exactly healthy but way better than butter and, in my opinion, much tastier.

This vanilla-mascapone frosting offers a lovely contrast to the chocolatey muffin – the combination is simply perfect!

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Chocolate-Cupcakes with Vanilla-Mascarpone-Frosting

yield: about 24 mini-cupcakes

preparation time: 20 min

baking time: 12-15 min

Ingredients:

for the muffins:

80g butter

1 pinch of salt

100g dark chocolate

1 egg

1 egg yolk

75g muscovado sugar

25g white sugar

40g flour

1 TL baking powder

40g dark chocolate, coarsely chopped

40g milk chocolate, coarsely chopped

for the frosting:

200g mascarpone

6 EL confectioners‘ sugar

1 TL vanilla extract

dark couverture chocolate

Preparation:

Preheat the oven to 190°C. Butter a mini-muffin-tin and sift a bit of flour on it.

Melt butter, salt and chocolate in a bowl over a bain-marie. Let it cool down for a bit.

Whisk egg, egg yolk and sugar with an electric whisk until fluffy. Add the chocolate mixture. Sift flour and baking powder on top. Add the chopped (dark and milk) chocolate.

Fill the batter into the mini-muffin-tun using a teaspoon. (Don’t fill them too high up – ¾ at most.)

Bake in the preheated oven for 12-15 minutes until there is a dry crust on top of the muffins. (The batter can still be relatively moist at this point. Don’t overbake or its typical texture will be lost.)

Let the muffins cool down for about 10 minutes in the tin. Then, take them out of the tin carefully and let them cool down completely on a cooling rack.

For the frosting, put mascarpone, confectioners‘ sugar and vanilla extract into a bowl and whisk shortly with an electric whisk. Put the mixture into a piping bag and pipe small rosettes onto each muffin. Using a vegetable peeler, make the chocolate decoration to top the cupcakes.

(recipe after “Mini-Muffins & mehr” by Joanna Farrow)

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To get a printed version: Download the pdf. (Both English and German versions available!)

Autumn has officially begun – and, while the pumkins in my garden still need a bit of time until I can harvest them, Chai-Latte powder is always at hand!

These cupcakes are cute and small and they have such a lovely flavour. I discovered the recipe about a year ago and today I just felt like baking those tiny cupcakes again. Why don’t you give it a try, too?